The Outsider
by banditBlue2
Summary: Whit was just an ordinary 16-year-old girl. Then she became a metahuman. All she wants is to protect her little brother and keep him safe from their father, but the Flash and his friends keep interfering. And some of his friends have pretty hair.
1. Chapter 1

Whit trudged home down the sidewalk. The sun was too bright, but the wind was too cold. It had been another long day. Another long day of not understanding algebra class. Of being bullied by Antonia. And now she had to get home in time to cook dinner or her dad would be mad at her.

Things always got bad when her dad was mad at her. Only two more years until she turned eighteen and could be on her own. But she would have to take care of Sid. She couldn't just leave him behind with their dad.

Where was Sid? He hadn't said anything annoying in a few minutes. She turned around, but the sidewalk was empty.

She huffed in frustration as she doubled back to find that little troublemaker. When she found him, she was going to kick his six-year-old ass.

A minute later, she had found him in an alley. He was standing with his back against the brick wall of an old building. Antonia Woodward was holding him there with one hand grasping the front of his shirt. Sid and Antonia both looked over at her. Whit squinted at them in the bright light of the afternoon sun slanting down from the other end of the alley.

"Let go of my brother," Whit said.

Antonia just gave her an arrogant smirk.

"What do you want?" Whit asked with more bravado than she felt. She always tried to hide how much the towering 12th-grader terrified her.

"I was just asking the little pipsqueak if I could borrow a few bucks." Antonia wiped across her nose with her sleeve and sniffed deeply to clear her nostrils. "But he says he doesn't have any."

"That's cuz I carry the cash." She didn't carry the cash. They didn't have any cash. They'd been on free lunch since Whit was old enough to figure out the paperwork. Any cash they did get their hands on was hidden in the back of her sock drawer, where even their dad couldn't find it.

Antonia finally let go of Sid and started towards Whit.

"Sid, run home," she ordered her brother, and he scampered off towards the open end at the other end of the alley. Antonia looked back at the retreating first-grader, but then directed her attention back to Whit.

Antonia had been bullying Whit since freshman year at the local high school. But they weren't at high school right now. That meant no teachers were there to protect Whit. But it also meant there weren't any teachers to suspend Whit for breaking a school rule, like having weapons on school property.

Whit pulled out her father's knife. She had no idea how to use it, but it looked threatening. She held it out in front of her, hoping Antonia would see it and back down. But Antonia didn't back down.

She charged directly at Whit, grabbed her wrist and twisted it around until Whit dropped the knife. "My big brother taught me that move," Antonia taunted her.

Then Antonia used her twisted wrist to maneuver the smaller girl until she was in the same position as her little brother had been moments before. "Where's the cash?" she breathed into Whit's face. Whit said nothing. Her mouth was too dry to form words, and she had no idea what to say.

Antonia waited a few seconds for a reaction, but when Whit didn't reply or surrender the nonexistent cash, she let her go. She relaxed for a second as Antonia walked away, but then Antonia was back. With the knife.

"Where's...the...cash?" Antonia was waving the knife right in front of Whit's face. She felt all the blood rush away from her head, and sweat soaked her armpits and neck. All she could focus on was the way the afternoon sun reflected off the shiny blade. Her breathing got fast, and her heart hammered inside her quivering chest. All the little hairs on her arms were standing up straight.

Then suddenly, Antonia flew back. Up and away from Whit. She hit the brick wall on the opposite side of the alley and seemed to hang there for a second, pinned against the wall. Stone dust erupted out of the bricks all around her. Then she fell down to the concrete ground, and her legs twisted underneath her. The knife clattered harmlessly to the ground.

Whit almost fell down, too, but she managed to hold herself up by clinging to the rough brick behind her. She had been so worked up a second ago, like a coiled spring. But now she just felt tired and drained.

She had no idea what just happened, but she was safe. She felt a smile grow on her face. Her bully was on the ground.

Her bully was still on the ground. Antonia wasn't moving. "Antonia?" Whit asked. "Woodward?"


	2. Chapter 2

Antonia still wasn't moving. "Antonia?" Whit asked again. The feeling of relief was quickly fading. Antonia may have bullied her, but that didn't mean she deserved to die.

Maybe she was playing possum. Whit waited for a few seconds. Still no movement. She could smell a sharp metallic odor in the air. She stepped forward and saw the bloody mess on the back of Antonia's head. There was a smear of blood up on the wall where her head had originally hit. Suddenly, Antonia moved. Or at least, her chest moved. She was breathing.

Whit felt relieved. But then she was worried again. She didn't want to get in trouble. Maybe Antonia wouldn't remember what happened when she woke up. Whit started to run in the direction she had sent her brother. Then she stopped. The knife. It might have her fingerprints on it or something. She doubled back and grabbed the knife. A small pool of blood was spreading out from Antonia's head.

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Sid was waiting for her outside their apartment building. She gave him the apartment key and told him to go on inside. She would be home later.

Then she doubled back towards the alley. She had already called 911 on a payphone and pretended to be a random girl who saw something suspicious. She made sure they had the exact location of the alley, but she didn't leave her name.

She might be failing algebra, but she wasn't dumb.

She went across the street from the alley entrance, and she found an open back door into an apartment building. She climbed all the way up and went out on the roof. She had a good view down at the alley across the street, despite the setting sun, which was hitting her in the eyes. If she stayed crouched down, they would have trouble seeing her from the street. The cops had already shown up, and they were crouched over Antonia. More sirens were coming closer, and soon there was an ambulance there with EMTs and a stretcher. Whit was relieved when she saw them put an oxygen mask on Antonia and rush off with the siren wailing. That meant she was still alive.

Whit couldn't bring herself to stop watching the alley. There were still cops there, so it was fascinating to watch. She knew her dad would be mad if supper wasn't ready on time, but she couldn't leave yet.

There was already yellow tape around the crime scene. (It was a crime scene now. She had committed a crime.) Then two men in suits arrived. Detectives. One was a big black man, and the other was a pretty guy with blond hair. She liked the blond one. He was cute.

The two men talked to the uniformed officers for a while, then they stood, looking at the wall for a while. Then they checked their watches and shifted impatiently. They were waiting for something. What were they waiting for?

Finally, the black detective got his cellphone out and made a quick phone call. Whit couldn't hear him, but his body language looked sharp and annoyed. Then a few minutes later, a young man in civilian clothes arrived. He was flustered and gangly but in a cute way. His brown hair was long, but it still stuck straight up in the air. Maybe he used lots of hair gel?

He had a metal suitcase with him, and he got stuff out of it. He was a CSI. She had seen that show. She watched him take photographs and samples and make measurements. Then he crouched down and leaned his head close to the ground. Like he was looking at something. Had she left something there? She checked her pocket and found the knife. What had he seen on the ground?

She saw him put a marker on the concrete near the pool of blood and take a photograph. Then he moved deeper into the alley and studied the ground again. He put down another marker and photographed the ground there. He continued down the alley, leaving behind a line of markers, zigging zagging back and forth slightly. He got slower as he got farther along, like the evidence was fainter there and harder to find.

She finally realized what it was. She knew what she had left behind. Footprints.

When she had run back to get the knife, she must have stepped in the blood. She had left footprints with her victim's blood. They would figure out it was her.

Wait, no, they wouldn't. Her boots were way too big for her, so the footprints wouldn't be her size. She wore her dad's old boots, since new shoes cost so much. She had to stuff newspaper down in the toes to get them to fit, and the other kids made fun of her, but now it was paying off.

She bent down and checked the boots. Deep in the treads, there were still faint traces of blood. It was dry and faint, but it was there. Could she wash them clean? No, she had seen CSI. And CSI: Miami and CSI: New York. They could detect tiny traces of blood, even when the suspect thought they were clean. And now she was the suspect. She pulled her boots off. She had to get rid of them.

She stood up and took one last look down at the crime scene. The CSI with the cute gelled hair was done documenting the footprints. He was standing back, deep in the alley, surveying the big picture. All the other policemen there were looking down, but the CSI was looking up. He was looking at her. She ducked down below the wall at the edge of the roof. She was so dumb, so dumb. She shouldn't have stood up.

She grabbed her boots and ran in her sock feet down the stairs and into the apartment's alley. She dumped the boots in the first dumpster she found and made her way back towards the street. She came out a few blocks down and across the street from the crime scene. She saw the CSI again, but now he was on the sidewalk, still looking up at the roof she had just been on. She blinked, and the CSI was gone. He must have ducked back into the alley. The sidewalk was cold and rough under her thin socks. She had to get home.

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Her dad was mad. She shouldn't have watched the crime scene so long. She shouldn't have taken a nap when she got home, but she had been so tired. She should have come home right away and started cooking. But she hadn't and now her dad was mad.

"You're so dumb, Whit. Why do we even call you "wit"?" he slurred. "You're dumber than a doornail, doorknob. You can't even plan things and...come home and...to cook a simple meal." He backhanded her across the face.

She cried on purpose because that seemed to make her dad hit her less. "I know I'm dumb. I'm sorry. I'll do better next time, I promise." She made sure to back up towards the hallway so that Sid was out of his field of vision. Out of sight, out of mind.

"You're right, you will do good...better next time." The lecture seemed to be drawing to a close. Pretty soon, the rest of the alcohol would kick in, and he would collapse on the couch. Just a little bit longer. Her dad wasn't too bad. He never hit her too many times in a row.

She kept her eyes on the ground in front of her. She closed them for a second to calm herself down. But when she opened them again, she saw that her dad had turned around and was staring at Sid in a stupor, like he had forgotten he had a son.

Sid was staring up at her dad angrily. "Don't hit her! She was fighting a bully for me!"

What was Sid doing? She had told him a million times to just shut up and stay in the living room when Dad was mad.

"Don't talk back to me, boy!" her dad roared. He lurched forward with an unsteady drunken gait.

Whit squeezed around him in the small kitchen and put herself in front of Sid.

"Get out a' my way, ya dumb bitch!" Her dad shoved her aside and started towards Sid. He had never gone after Sid before. This wasn't supposed to happen. Why couldn't Sid have just shut up and stayed in the living room?

"No, don't touch him!" she screamed, and her arms began to tingle as all her hairs stood up. It felt like static electricity was surging through her muscles. Back in the alley, it had felt like panic, but now it felt like power. Suddenly, the plaster ceiling in the kitchen cracked and crumbled. Then the wooden support beams began to crash down. She saw her father get hit in the head with a beam, before she flung herself around and covered Sid with her body. She had to protect him.

Finally, all the rumbling stopped, and there was just the sound of dust spreading out into the air. All the energizing power from a minute ago had left her. She just felt dead tired, like all her muscles were made of lead. The dust was irritating her eyes, so she closed them. And slipped into blissful darkness.


	3. Chapter 3

She woke up in the hospital. There was a clear tube in her arm. An IV, her muddled brain finally realized. She followed the tube with her eyes up to a tall metal pole with a bag on it. Her foggy eyes took a minute to focus on the letters and read them. Saline.

It was dark around her bed, but there were thin walls nearby and there was light coming under and over and between the walls. There were voices, too, and lots of beeping.

She tried to sit up, and a nurse rushed in and checked the monitor next to the bed. The monitor had lots of wires coming out of it. Some of the wires were connected to her. To the plastic thing on her finger and to the fabric around her upper arm. She felt like she should recognize these things, but she couldn't think straight right now.

Whit's forehead felt itchy, but when she reached up to scratch it, the nurse swatted her hand away. She didn't like being swatted, but she put her hand down anyway.

"Just rest, sweetie. You'll feel better soon," said the nurse in a cooing voice. So Whit laid back down and closed her eyes. It felt good to sleep.

But there was something she needed to take care of. Something important. She had wrapped herself around it to protect it. Her eyes snapped open. "Sid, where's Sid?"

The nurse laid a hand on her shoulder to push her back down. She didn't like being pushed down. "Is that your brother? He's fine. He's down at the nurse's station, do you want me to get him?"

She nodded.

A minute later, the nurse brought Sid down, and he came in and sat in the chair beside her bed. Her jacket was on the back of the chair. Sid didn't say anything, but he held her hand, and she suddenly calmed down. Her eyes drifted shut again, and she fell asleep again.

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Whit was standing on a beach watching Sid build a sand castle close enough to the surf that the waves would swamp it soon. He liked to watch his castles get destroyed. A blond man in a suit put his hand on her shoulder. She looked over at him, standing there in the loose sand in his nice shoes. His tie fluttered in the breeze, and his green eyes looked gorgeous in the summer sunlight. "I'm so glad you passed Algebra," he said. She giggled.

A distant deep voice rumbled. "We just think it'd be better to talk to them while it's fresh on their minds."

A woman's sharp voice countered, "They're children, and they're recovering from a partial building collapse, and it's three o'clock in the morning."

The deep voice calmly replied, "She's sixteen, so we only need a parent present if she requests it."

Whit opened her eyes. She could suddenly think clearly. She was in a hospital, not on a beach. That had all been a dream. Sid was sleeping in the chair next to her. She had a heart rate monitor on her finger, there was a blood pressure cuff around her arm, and there was a bandage on her temple. Her clothes she had been wearing were gone, and now she was in a hospital gown and pajama pants and slipper socks.

Also, something weird was going on. She needed answers.

She sat up and looked out through the curtains surrounding her bed. She could see the nurse through the gap, and there were two men standing in front of her, but she could only see their feet under the privacy curtains.

"Officers, you need to leave and come back in the morning," said the nurse firmly.

"What's going on?" she asked.

The nurse turned her head and came over to her bed. She turned on some lights over the bed and checked over Whit with a stethoscope and a pen light. "What's going on? Who are they?" She figured she would just keep asking questions until she got some answers.

"They're some police officers, and they want to ask you some questions. But they are going to come back _tomorrow_ when you're feeling better." The nurse looked over her shoulder and said the last part in a loud voice, so the men outside could hear.

"I feel fine right now," she replied. She knew what she was supposed to say to the police. Her father had taught her what to say. "I want to talk to them now."

The nurse pursed her thin lips with disapproval, but she stood up and opened the curtains to reveal two men. One was tall and black. The other was pretty and blond and young, and she had just seen him in her dream. They had been at the crime scene. She heard the monitor next to her beep as her heart rate spiked. "Can you take the wires off?" she suddenly asked the nurse. "I don't like all the monitors."

"Sure," the nurse said warmly. Happy to be able to delay the detectives a bit longer. Finally all the wires were gone. The saline IV must have been taken out while she was asleep. She no longer had any tubes or wires tying her down. She kicked off the blanket and sat cross-legged on top of the bed. If she had to, she could make a run for it.

"Do you want me to take your brother back to the nurse's station, so you can speak in private?" the nurse asked.

"No, he can sit across the hall." She pointed at the line of chairs along the wall across from her room. "I want to keep an eye on him."

The nurse smiled tightly, gave a parting glare to the detectives, then exited. She escorted Sid across to his new chair and gave him a pocket game to play with. He was wearing her jacket now.

There was only one chair next to Whit's bed, so both men stayed standing to speak with her. "I'm Detective West, and this is…" Whit stopped listening as she gazed into the dreamy blue eyes of the blond detective. Blue eyes were nice, too. She hadn't been able to tell what color they were from the rooftop. She snapped back to reality to hear Detective West say "We want to talk to you about your father."

She felt her whole body relax. They hadn't connected her to Antonia. This was just about her father. She knew how to do these interviews. She had done them a million times.

They started with the normal questions. What's your name, date of birth, father's name, etc. She waived her right to have a parent present.

"What time did you father get home tonight?"

"Around six o'clock, like usual."

"You're sure it was six o'clock?"

"Yeah, I remember cuz the evening news was just starting."

"And what happened after he got home? What was the evening routine?" Detective West was asking most of the questions. She tried not to stare at the pretty detective.

"Me and Sid both hugged him, and he asked us how school went. He's really proud of how well I'm doing in algebra class. He started cooking dinner, and I was in the living room with Sid. Then we heard some crashing from the kitchen. We went over and looked in to check on him, then the ceiling fell down. My dad yelled at us to take cover, so me and Sid jumped back, but my dad was still in the kitchen. Then I woke up here." She hoped any bruises on her face would be assumed to be from the ceiling collapse. She hadn't had a chance to see herself in a mirror yet.

The detectives glanced at each other. "So, your dad was the only one in the kitchen when the ceiling fell?"

"Yeah," she answered. She hoped that was the same story her dad had given. She wished she'd had a chance to find out what she was supposed to say. "Why, what did he tell you guys?"

The pretty detective shifted on his feet. "We haven't had a chance to interview him yet," he said carefully.

"Why not?" she asked. There was something they weren't telling her. "Is he okay?" If he was dead, then she and Sid were free.

"He's fine," West said quickly. Damn. He paused before speaking again, like he was choosing his words carefully. "Your father was brought to the hospital along with you and your brother. His injuries seemed to be more severe, so he was taken to the emergency room. But when we went to interview him about the incident at your apartment, he was missing."

West paused again, then looked at her carefully. "Do you have any idea where he might have gone?"

"He's probably just confused after the accident," she said quickly.

The detectives nodded along with her, even though neither believed her lie.

Now the pretty detective stepped forward slightly. "We just have one more question, Ms. Whitaker." His blue eyes were sharp and observant. Detective West gave him a warning glance, but he pressed on. "Does your father know Antonia Woodward?"

Her breath caught in her throat. She wondered if her face had gone pale. She looked down like she was racking her brain for an answer. "Um, I mean, I go to the same school as her. So, maybe he's seen her at Parents' Night." Her dad had never gone to Parents' Night. "Why do you ask?"

Detective West was giving the stink eye to his partner, but Pretty Boy pressed on, "Antonia was attacked this afternoon. The crime scene was very similar to the destruction found in your apartment this evening. Footprints were found at that crime scene that are the same size as your father's, and an investigator saw someone with the same color hair as your father on a rooftop nearby. Are you aware of the emergence of metahumans in this city?"

West grabbed his partner by the elbow part of the way through his spiel, but Pretty Boy didn't shut up. They thought it was her dad. They thought it was her dad, but they would figure out it was her really soon. They were detectives. They would figure it out. They'd take her away, and she wouldn't be able to protect Sid. She was breathing too fast, and her stomach clenched up painfully.

West had dragged his partner out into the hallway to speak with him privately. West glanced back at her sympathetically before turning and hissing angrily at Pretty Boy. Whit only caught part of what he was saying. "You're scaring … No … just a kid."

She looked up, and Sid was staring at her and at them with wide eyes. He didn't know what was going on, but he was starting to get scared. The detectives were almost done arguing. They were going to come back, and they might decide to keep an eye on her. Now was her chance.

She leapt to her feet and ran across the hallway and swept Sid up in her arms. Sid's pocket game clattered on the linoleum floor.

"Wait," Detective West called from behind her.

She didn't see any stairs, but there was an elevator. She hit the button before turning around to face the detectives. The hairs on her arms were standing straight up, and it felt like tiny buzzing snakes were slithering under her skin.

The detectives were coming towards her slowly with their hands empty and outstretched. West motioned for Pretty Boy to stay back, but he wouldn't.

West spoke to her gently, "Calm down, calm down. We can help you. We can protect you. We won't let him hurt you." Behind him, she saw Pretty Boy reaching one hand back towards his holster.

Whit clung Sid to her chest with one arm and held out her other hand out towards the detectives with her palm facing them. The elevator dinged. She turned to look at it, and as soon as her back was turned, she felt a hand wrap around her outstretched wrist. Instinctively, she fired a burst of whatever was inside her out from her palm. She turned around to see that she had hit the blond detective in the middle of the chest. He flew back against some curtains and IV poles.

She could tell the blast was weaker than her earlier ones that day, but she had hit him directly in the chest. She heard the elevator doors open up behind her, so she ducked in with Sid crying fearfully into her chest. Detective West stared at her in shock, and she pointed her palm at him threateningly, even though she knew she didn't have enough of a charge to hit him with anything. But he backed away with a look of fear and horror on his face. Just at the doors were closing around her, she darted her eyes over to look at Pretty Boy. She couldn't tell if he was moving.

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She dropped Sid down next to her. His little body felt so heavy all of the sudden. She held his hand and kept him close to her in the big empty elevator. His arms were covered in chill bumps, and he was shivering. He was terrified. He wasn't supposed to be terrified. She was supposed to protect him.

She searched around in her jacket, trying to find the hidden inside pocket. It was awkward to find it with Sid still wearing the jacket, but finally, she found what she was looking for.

As soon as the doors opened on the ground floor, she ducked out with him in tow. She went out the back exit, emerging into a small alcove behind the hospital. It was dark, and the wind was cold, and her clothes were thin. The pavement was hard and uneven, and she could feel painful pebbles through the slipper socks. She missed her boots.

She could see a taxi stand across a small parking lot. She only had to make it there, and she could finagle a way into a ride, even if it was a short one. She felt tired and heavy. All she wanted to do was sleep for hours, but she had to get away first.

She started across the parking lot, when suddenly there was a man in front of her. He had a red suit on from head to toe, and it even covered his hair and part of his face. She recognized him from an online blog she sometimes read. He was the Flash.

He gave her a cute toothy smile, and he held his hands out in a calming gesture. "Hey, let's slow down here and talk."

She got the knife out and held it in front of her. Not that it would deter the fastest man alive. She hadn't even been able to fight off a normal human girl.

But the Flash kept his distance and kept trying to talk to her. She maneuvered so that a red car was between her and the Flash. She could throw the car at him, but she felt no power running through her. The hairs in her arms were flat. Sid clung to her wrist and wailed.

She was almost dizzy with exhaustion, and she knew she couldn't defend herself, much less her brother.

Sid screamed, "Get away from my sister!"

She looked down at the small boy by her side. A swell of love blossomed inside of her chest. He still had round baby cheeks, but he was willing to stand up to a metahuman to protect his sister. She looked back up at the Flash. She and Sid stood side by side, hand in hand, them against the world. She felt like she could do anything. The red car flipped up and flew at the Flash.

The Flash easily dodged it with his superspeed, but Whit took the opportunity to run. She scooped up Sid and sprinted towards the flight of concrete stairs that led up to the taxi stand. Or she tried to sprint. Sid was a load of bricks in her arms, and her legs were like lead. She felt dizzy, and her vision was tunneling.

She made it to the first landing of the stairs. Then she fell down, sitting on the landing and leaning back against the railing. Sid was in one arm, and the knife was held loosely in her other hand.

With her fuzzy narrow vision, she saw a blurry red figure appear in front of her and kneel down slowly. Then everything went black.

She woke up in a small padded blue room. Her knife was gone and so was Sid.


	4. Chapter 4

Whit studied the picture on the smartphone. Sid's cute little face smiled proudly over a banana split, and a friendly-looking black woman sat next to him at the wooden dining table. She felt her shoulders relax a bit.

"If you want, we can let you call him? There's no cellphone signal inside the cell, so we'd have to hook up the audio through the speakers…" explained the guy with long hair. He said his name was Cisco, and he talked a lot, like he was really excited about everything.

"Joe, I mean Detective West, is a foster parent. I mean, he practically raised m...a friend of mine," said the Flash. He still had his mask on, but his smile looked friendly, and he had nice green eyes.

Whit passed the phone back through the slot in the door and wrapped her arms around herself again. She liked how soft the STAR labs sweatshirt was.

"What about the other detective? The one with the … pretty hair?" Whit asked shyly.

"Detective Thawne is fine," said Dr. Snow.

Thawne, that was a nice name. Theresa Thawne would be a fun name to write in cursive. She shook her head and tuned back into the conversation. Now wasn't the time. Dr. Snow was still talking. "...pick him up, and they've already discharged him from the hospital."

"Thankfully, he didn't have to travel far to get help," joked Cisco. "Good thing you attacked him at the hos-" He stopped abruptly when he saw Whit wince at his bluntness.

"Theresa, do you have any allergies?" said Dr. Snow quickly.

"No, and everyone calls me Whit."

"Whit," said Cisco, trying to undo his earlier words. "Do they call you that cuz you're smart?"

"My mom's name was Theresa, so it's easier to just call me Whit."

" _Was_?" asked Dr. Snow. "Did she pass away?"

Whit nodded.

"How did she die?" the doctor asked without emotion. Cisco nudged her and gave her a look. Snow looked up from her clipboard and clarified, "Is it medically relevant? Like a hereditary condition?"

"No, she was shot in a robbery at our old apartment. It was years ago." Whit hugged herself tighter.

"I'm sorry. I know … I mean, that must have been tough," said the Flash in a soft voice.

"What about Antonia?" asked Whit without looking up. She was scared to hear the answer, but she had to know.

"She's fine, too. She's still in the hospital, but it's nothing life-threatening," said Dr. Snow. Whit relaxed her shoulders a little more. "Can you tell me more about how it felt, right before one of the … incidents?"

Then all the tension was back. Whit hunched her shoulders. She didn't want to talk about this.

"Caitlin, the bloodwork is done," said a male voice, over the intercom.

"I'll be up in a moment, Dr. Wells," said Dr. Snow.

"Want a lift?" asked the Flash.

The doctor nodded, and the two of them disappeared in a flash, blowing Cisco's hair into his face. He spat out the errant strands with resigned body language. It must be a frequent occurrence. Then he looked around and realized they were the only two still there. They stared at each other, neither knowing what to do.

Then Cisco held up his smartphone. "Uh, do you wanna play any games?"

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"Okay, you can put your shoes back on," said Dr. Snow. "Your soles are scuffed up, but you don't need stitches or bandages. I'd like to reapply some ointment later."

"Why did you take your boots off yesterday?" asked Cisco.

"At the crime scene, I saw the CSI-guy, the one who has cute hair that goes straight up." Whit saw the Flash shuffle his feet a bit. "I saw him find my footprints, so I threw my boots away." Whit got off the hospital bed to pick her new shoes up from the floor.

"Pretty smart," said Cisco, nodding in approval, but Whit knew she wasn't smart.

Whit loved her new shoes. They fit perfectly. They were bright and clean, and there was a white stripe around the base of the shoe with no scuff marks on it yet. Dr. Snow had brought her a change of clothes, socks, and these beautiful shoes. She couldn't wait to show them to Sid.

She sat on the floor to tie her laces, then she got back on the hospital bed and let her feet dangle off the edge. Everyone was gathered in the "Cortex," as they called it.

"Are there any medical conditions in your family?" asked Dr. Snow.

"No, not really. We don't have much family. My mom had a sister, but I've never met her."

Dr. Snow switched out the bandage on her forehead. It didn't hurt much.

"The bloodwork confirms that she has the metahuman gene," said Dr. Wells. He was studying one of the computers on the other side of the room. She had seen him on tv a few times. She liked his eyes.

"There's a metahuman gene?" Whit asked. She didn't know much beyond a biology class a few years ago that she had barely passed, but she knew the basics. "So, is my dad a metahuman?"

(Her dad with superpowers. That would be bad.)

"No," explained Caitlin. "The metahuman gene is mitochondrial, so it is strictly matrilineal."

Whit looked at her blankly. "Huh?"

"You got it from your momma," explained Cisco without looking up from his tablet. Then he put the pen he was chewing on back in his mouth.

"To be a metahuman, you have to inherit the metahuman gene, and be exposed to radiation from the Particle Accelerator," explained the Flash. "That's why you're telekinetic."

Whit looked over at Cisco again. "You can move stuff with your mind," he translated.

"Where were you when the Particle Accelerator exploded?" asked Dr. Snow.

That was easy to answer. It was a vivid memory. "I was in the kitchen, getting some milk for Sid to drink. He'd had a nightmare. Then there was a flash of light, and the windows broke, and a lot of containers in the kitchen exploded. I got a lot of cuts from the glass, but Sid was around the corner, so he wasn't hurt as bad."

Dr. Snow nodded. "You were probably exposed to something in the kitchen that activated your metahuman gene. But you weren't able to use your power until some time had passed and you were in a stressful situation."

Dr. Wells steered his wheelchair around the bank of computers and towards Whit. She tried not to stare at his unmoving legs or his pretty eyes. "I think it's time we tested your powers."

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Whit held her hands out in front of her, with her palms pointed at the stacks of cardboard boxes. She felt stupid. Nothing was happening.

Cisco slurped his slushie back on the observation platform, and even that sound was loud in the vast concrete room. Whit cringed as she thought about everyone staring at her.

"Hey," said the Flash softly. He had been up on the platform with Cisco, but now he was standing right next to her. She felt the breeze of his movement a second later as his wake caught up with him. "Don't worry. It takes time to figure out how to control what you can do."

"It's possible your powers are triggered by emotions," said Dr. Snow over the intercom. She was back in the Cortex with Dr. Wells, monitoring the various sensors.

"Why don't you tell us a story, about something emotional?" said the Flash. "Something similar to what happened when you used your powers yesterday."

"Ummm." She tried to think. "Last year, my dad got mad at me. It was my fault. I burned the casserole. He said I was stupid. He shoved me really hard, and I lost my balance, and I put my arm down wrong. It got twisted up, and I broke my wrist. Dad had to take me to the doctor, and he made me tell them that I had been playing somewhere off-limits and that's where I got hurt. So all the doctors and nurses kept lecturing me to do what my dad told me and to not break the rules and to be more careful."

Her throat got tight. The Flash reached over and put his gloved hand on her shoulder. A guy was touching her. Butterflies bubbled deep in her tummy. Suddenly the hand was gone. The Flash looked embarrassed, like he felt bad for making her uncomfortable. She didn't know how to tell him she had liked it.

She looked up at the cardboard boxes. They were still in neat little towers, surrounded by cardboard cutouts of the people at STAR labs. None of them had moved. She was being mocked by cardboard.

Dr. Wells voice suddenly boomed out from the intercom. "It's possible that the trigger isn't emotions, but specific emotions. Maybe sadness isn't a trigger, but something energetic like fear or anger is."

"Yeah, what makes you angry?" asked the Flash from a respectful distance.

"Um, I don't really get angry at anyone. I mean, except for when…" She trailed off.

"When what?" The Flash said encouragingly.

"I never got mad at my dad, until ... " She took a deep breath and swallowed around the knot that was still in her throat. "Until, last night, when he went after Sid."

A fierce fire sparked deep in her heart and traveled down her arms like lightning and exploded out through her hands. The boxes flew across the room and so did the cardboard cutouts. And so did the dolly Cisco had used to position the boxes. And the various scaffolding. There was a moment of still silence while everything flew through the air.

Then everything crashed loudly into the far wall and fell to the ground. The Flash took another step away from her. She felt so scared and ashamed.

From behind her she heard Cisco exclaim, "That was so cool!"

"Cisco, don't…" she heard Caitlin say.

She was dizzy, and her chest felt tight. She fell down to her knees and gasped for air. She was breathing as fast as she could, but she still felt like she was going to faint. She stared down at her violent hands in fear.

Suddenly, the Flash was crouched in front of her. He took his mask off, and she recognized him. He was the CSI from earlier, and he had really cute hair, and it was even cuter all mussed up from the hood. She reached out her hand towards him to touch it. Then she remembered that she had said he was cute before when she was talking about the crime scene. Oh, God, this was so embarrassing. Then she fainted.

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She woke up in the padded blue cell again. Cisco was sitting outside the cell, playing games on his phone.

"Hey, Cisco," she said in a tired voice.

"Hey, you're awake!" He jumped to his feet and went over to a computer screen on the wall. He tapped some icons, and the glass door to the cell hissed open.

"Sorry for putting you back in the cell," he explained, "but until you have a handle on your powers, this is safer for everyone. Let's go talk to Caitlin. She wants to go over your test results."

He escorted her to the elevator, and they went up to the main floor. "What time is it?" Whit asked suddenly while they were in the hallway outside the Cortex.

"Almost 10 o'clock," said Cisco.

She hadn't talked to Sid all day, and it was almost evening and his bedtime. "I need to talk to Sid."

"Okay, sure," said Cisco. He tapped on his phone quickly, and then started a video call with Joe. He passed it over to Whit.

Sid's round little face filled the whole screen. He had chocolate on both corners of his mouth. "Whit! What's up? Joe made lasagna, and Iris made hot chocolate, and we played Parcheesi, and I won like four times!"

"He only won twice," said Joe's deep voice from behind him.

"Good job," Whit said, trying not to get choked up. Sid was okay. He was okay.

"I kept telling them to let me talk to you. I kept asking, but they said you were busy. I'm glad you called me. I like to talk to you." He was prattling. He always prattled when he was energetic and wound up.

Dr. Snow was standing at the door to the Cortex, beckoning for Cisco and Whit to come in.

"When can I go home?" Sid asked.

"Soon," she promised him.

Sid looked annoyed, but he didn't say anything.

Whit swallowed around the knot in her throat. She didn't want Sid to think she was upset. "Well, just keep being good for Joe. I'll see you soon."

Sid looked disappointed that they couldn't talk for longer. "Okay, good night, Whit. I love you."

"Good night, Sid. I love you, too." She winked at him, then ended the call.

Dr. Snow and Cisco were doing a non-verbal argument about something. As soon as they realized she was off the phone, they switched to words.

"She was talking to her brother, Caitlin."

Caitlin turned to Whit. "Sorry, I didn't realize you were on the phone. You can call him back if you want."

"No," said Whit, squaring her shoulders. "Cisco said you have my test results."

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Back at the West residence, Joe put his smartphone away. "Okay, kiddo, time for bed."

Sid stared up at him with a grumpy frown. "No, I want to go home. I want to see Whit."

"You just talked to her. You can see her soon." Joe had raised two kids by himself. He knew better than to cave to the demands of a six-year-old. "Right now, it's time for bed."

"I want to see Whit!"

Joe walked over to the little boy, prepared to carry him upstairs if necessary. "You can see her soon. Come on, bedtime."

Sid stared up at him defiantly, with an expression of anger that would have looked more intimidating if he wasn't a six-year-old with baby cheeks. The detective noticed that the boy was so angry that there were goosebumps forming on his arms.

Joe reached down to pick him up, but before he could touch him, the kitchen ceiling collapsed.


	5. Chapter 5

"I've checked your glucose levels and blood pressure, and I think you just need rest after you use your powers. It takes a lot out of you. It's a common problem for metahumans."

"I need to eat 850 tacos a day, or else I faint," explained Barry. AKA the Flash. AKA the guy she described as cute, not realizing he was in the room when she said that. She squirmed at the thought.

"Or the equivalent. Like energy bars or whatever," said Barry quickly, misinterpreting her discomfort.

Barry's cell phone rang, so he ducked out to answer it. Dr. Snow finished rebandaging Whit's forehead.

Barry came back in with a serious expression on his face. Dr. Snow asked, "What's wrong?"

Barry took a deep breath and reported, "Iris says she found Joe unconscious in the kitchen with the ceiling collapsed on top of him, and there's no sign of Sid."

"Your brother is a metahuman," said Dr. Wells, coming into the room behind Barry.

They all looked at Whit, and Whit turned away and looked at the floor and squeezed her tearful eyes shut against a world that kept going wrong.

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"Where would he go?" asked Dr. Snow.

"I'd go to the arcade," piped up Cisco.

"Maybe to a friend's house," suggested Dr. Wells.

"No, he's looking for his family. He's looking for Whit," said Barry with finality. Everyone looked over at him. "I used to be a runaway," he explained.

"Where would he look for you?" asked Dr. Snow.

"The best place to find me would be our apartment," said Whit. "Even if the ceiling is gone."

A second later, the Flash suit was off the manikin, and Barry was ready to zoom off to find the missing boy.

"Wait," pled Whit. "Take me with you."

The Flash paused, unsure.

"Please, he trusts me, he'll listen to me." Whit wasn't sure about many things in her life, but she was sure about this. She would do anything for Sid.

The Flash looked around at his team, and they all gave him their tacit approval. He scooped Whit up bridal style, and a few dizzying seconds later, they were in her apartment. She tried not to think about how good it felt to be held by a cute guy like him. She hated herself for thinking about these things when Sid was in danger.

"Wait here," she told Barry, and she went down the hallway into her and Sid's tiny shared bedroom. Her little brother sat on his bed, like he was petulantly waiting for her. As soon as she walked in, his face brightened up, and he bounced in place.

"You're home!" he said excitedly.

"Hey, Sid. I need you to come with me, okay?" Whit said gently. She knew that forcing her brother to do anything would just make him more stubborn.

"Why can't we stay here? This is our home," he argued.

"It's not safe here. We need to leave. Right now." She made no move to force him, but he could hear the steel in her voice. He reluctantly got up, but first he went over to the chest of drawers and reached into the back of the sock drawer for their meager cash.

Suddenly, the Flash was next to her. "Whit, we have to go. Cisco says he saw your dad on the security cameras." He gently pulled on her elbow, desperate to get her to safety but waiting for her assent.

"Let go of my sister," said Sid darkly from across the room. The Flash looked over at the small boy, who had an expression of darkness growing on his babyish features. The Flash instinctively tried to pull Whit behind him to protect her, but that was the wrong thing to do.

An inhuman screech came out of Sid and suddenly, the Flash was smashed back into the bedroom wall. Whit was grazed and knocked off to the side. She quickly scrambled up to check on the Flash and was relieved to see he was still breathing, even if he was unconscious. While she was checking on him, she heard Sid scamper past her and out into the hallway. She chased after him.

She skirted around the rubble in the kitchen and found Sid in the living room. Hugging her dad's leg. Her dad had his fingers tangled possessively in Sid's soft blond curls. His other hand had a revolver pointed directly at her.


	6. Chapter 6

Her father smiled at her calmly from behind the cold steel revolver. He moved his hand through Sid's curls in a parody of affection.

One of her father's eyes was swollen shut from his injuries, and a harsh red gash ran across his temple and back under his greasy brown hair. The bandage on his side had blood seeping through it and staining his ragged grey t-shirt. She stared at the revolver. She stood as still as possible, but inside her mind, the gears were spinning fast.

"Did you shoot mom?" she asked.

Her dad cocked his head at her. A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth. "She wouldn't do as she was told," he said. "I was her husband, and she should have respected me. It was her own fault. I _had_ to kill her."

Sweat began to form on her forehead, and the bandage started to itch, but she knew better than to move right now."Now what happens?" she asked. What was going to happen to Sid?

"You haven't been a good daughter. You tried to kill me." He gestured at the rubble behind her in the kitchen. "I can keep Sid, he's been a good boy." He rubbed at Sid's hair roughly. "But with you, I don't have a choice."

The hair on her arms stood on end, and she envisioned her father as a cardboard box that she wanted to fling against the far wall.

But then she remembered the wheeled dolly and the scaffolding and the cardboard cutouts of the people at STAR labs. All the objects around the boxes also flying back. She had power but no accuracy. Sid was standing right next to her father.

She didn't want her father to be the last thing she saw before she died. She looked down at Sid. At his precious little curls. So different from her own straight brown hair. But Sid wasn't looking at her. He was looking up at her father. With unbridled anger.

Her father hadn't noticed it yet. Hadn't been paying attention to Sid. So he didn't have any warning before a concussive blast slammed into him and pushed him across the room. The gun went off while he was mid-air, but the bullet flew wide and hit the wall a few feet to Whit's left. Her father smashed into the living room windows, but he didn't go through them. He fell to the floor under the windows, and the gun fell from his grasp. Sid thumped to the floor as he sat down on the threadbare carpet, but he was still conscious.

Whit felt the adrenaline bleed out from her muscles. She was glad Sid was safe, but she was also glad her father wasn't dead. She remembered the guilt when she saw Antonia being carted off in an ambulance. She didn't want Sid to have to live with the guilt of a death on his conscience.

She was so glad it was over. But then she looked over and saw that Sid was still staring at their father with death in his eyes. Everything slowed down. She saw the dining room table float up in the air. She couldn't let Sid become a murderer.

"No!" she screamed, and she threw a blast in between Sid and her father. It hit the table midflight, and the table splintered to pieces against the wall, missing the slumped figure of her father by inches.

Sid laid back on the floor in exhaustion. Whit was tired, too, but she found the strength to keep going. She stumbled over to Sid and picked him up. He seemed to get heavier every day. She made her way out of the apartment and into the hall. If she could find a neighbor that was awake and would let them in, she could call 911 and get help.

"Put him down," she heard the strained voice of her father say from behind her. She turned around, swaying slightly on her feet. "Put him down. I don't want to shoot him, too." She stared at him blankly. It had been a long day. She had nothing left. She let Sid slowly slide down her body and crumple onto the floor. She stared down at her little brother's sleeping form and angelic face. She was glad the last thing she would ever see would be the person she loved most in this world.

"Grant Whitaker, you are under arrest for murder, attempted murder, and child abuse. Drop your weapon and put your hands up."

Whit looked behind her father and saw the blond detective, but her muddled brain still couldn't remember his name. Detective Pretty Boy had a bruise on his temple and a gun pointed at her father's head, but her father still hadn't put his revolver down. "Well, if I'm already going down for murder…" Her father aimed at her again, but suddenly he was gone.

She heard the gun go off, but the hallway was gone and the floor beneath her feet was gone and everything around her was streaked and fuzzy. Was this what death felt like?

Then suddenly she was standing outside on the sidewalk, all alone. A second later, the Flash showed up with her brother in his arms. "Thank you," she said, but she couldn't hear the words. Maybe she didn't actually say them. She reached out to take Sid in her own arms, but she crumpled to her knees before she could reach him.

"Hey, just lie here on the ground, okay," said a gentle female voice beside her. She looked over to see Dr. Snow holding her arm and helping her lie down. Cisco was standing behind them, and the Flash was passing Sid over to him before disappearing again with a crackle of electricity. Then everything went dark again.

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 _A few days later:_

Sid was asleep next to her, with his curly head resting in her lap. He wasn't exhausted from using his powers. He hadn't thrown anything since that night when her father…

Her brother was just tired from the long car ride. Up front, Detective Joe West was riding shotgun, trying to unfold a map with one arm in a sling. His daughter, Iris West, was driving.

"This is the advantage of modern GPS's and smartphones," said Iris. "You can use them one-handed."

"I don't trust those things. At least with a paper map, you don't have to worry about wi-fi signal or low battery," Joe protested good-naturedly.

"They don't use wi-fi. They use… You know what nevermind, keep your paper maps."

Their arguing was nothing like how Whit used to argue with her dad. Joe and Iris's conversation felt like it could dissolve into laughter at any second, and she could tell how much they loved each other.

Joe finally got the map to behave somewhat. "Well anyway, the driveway should be coming up soon on the left."

"In a quarter of a mile, your destination will be on the right," chimed in the electronic voice of Iris's GPS app with an almost smug tone.

"See, the GPS is wrong. It's on the left, not the right," said Joe. Then he studied the map again. And rotated it upside down. "Oh, wait, it _is_ on the right. Okay, just listen to the GPS, not your dear old dad."

Iris chuckled as she turned off the paved road onto the beginning of a long unpaved driveway. Sid woke up at the sound of the car wheels grinding over the gravel. "We're almost there," Whit told him, and he craned his neck to see out the windows.

There were trees close to the driveway on both sides, but then they gave way to reveal a small meadow abloom with wildflowers. There was a small cottage in the middle of the meadow. The aunt they had never met came out on the porch and waited for the car to pull up. She had the same wavy blond hair as Sid and their mother.

They all got out of the car and stretched their stiff limbs. Sid went over to play with the dog that was lying on the porch. Whit just stood there, not sure what to do. Joe saw her hesitance, and he went over to their aunt and gave her some documents and papers to sign. She saw him whisper some discreet words of advice, making sure the woman knew what she was getting into with taking custody of two underage metahumans. Her aunt just grinned good naturedly and shrugged at the randomness of life.

Iris put Sid and Whit's small suitcases on the porch. All that was left of their life in Central City.

Whit still stood by the car and stared at all the space around them. The wide open space, full of flowers and trees. Away from the city and the people and the multi-story buildings where ceilings support the apartments above. Away from all the fragile vulnerable things that she and Sid might destroy before they figured out how to control their powers. Away from Iron Heights, where their father would live out the rest of his days.

Finally, the paperwork and quiet warnings were done, and Joe and Iris went back and stood by the car. Aunt Elizabeth's curly blond hair fluttered in the breeze as she walked over to Whit.

Whit stood still, twirling her straight brown hair in one finger. The hair that was as straight and brown as her dad's.

"Theresa," she said warmly. She looked deep into Whit's eyes, and a flash of recognition bloomed on her aunt's face. "You have your mother's eyes."

Theresa started crying and stepped forward into her aunt's embrace. She was home.


End file.
